Warforged Mecha

[cartejos]

I want to play a Warforged with a kind of specific flavor.
I want his boots to be what allows him to fly, preferably with perfect maneuverability.
I want him to use 2 Wands in Wand Sheaths with Cull Wand Essence for blasting, as well as either 1 or 2 Battlefists.

I want a 4th level Buff spell that might work well with the build, and the second spell will almost definitely be Greater Mighty Wallop.

My questions would probably be:

How does TWF'ing with Warforged Slams work? I seem to recall they only have 1 slam attack, so could they wield 2 battlefists and TWF like that?

What's the best 4th level Buff/De-buff spell to put in a wand? I'm thinking Greater Invisibility or something like that.

For the current build, with perfect flight in mind, I was thinking along the lines of Artificer 6/Incarnate 4/??? 10 Airstep Sandal soulmeld will jam on a real nice 50 foot perfect fly, with craft wand and retain essence, and the warforged artificer goodies from those levels.

[Goaty14]

What's the best 4th level Buff/De-buff spell to put in a wand? I'm thinking Greater Invisibility or something like that.

Polymorph


Airstep Sandal soulmeld will jam on a real nice 50 foot perfect fly, with craft wand and retain essence, and the warforged artificer goodies from those levels.

Airstep Sandals make you end your movement on solid ground, otherwise you fall. So no, not really flight.

[Darrin]

How does TWF'ing with Warforged Slams work? I seem to recall they only have 1 slam attack, so could they wield 2 battlefists and TWF like that?


A slam is a natural weapon, which involves different rules than manufactured weapons. When you add a battlefist... the rules all go a bit pear-shaped.

So... how to break this down. Well, ok, let's start with TWF + slam. The key sticking point here is natural weapons do not get iterative attacks and can only attack once per round. As per the Monster Manual p. 312:

"Creatures do not receive additional attacks from a high base attack bonus when using natural weapons."

However, there's no explicit rule that says they can't be used with the TWF rules. If your BAB is under +6, and thus you don't get a second iterative or offhand attack, there's nothing in the rules that says you can't attack with a natural weapon as either your primary or offhand attack.

Once you get a second iterative or offhand attack... well, that all boils down to whether or not you think Improved TWF/Greater TWF allows you to violate the rule quoted above. Since your additional offhand attacks are granted by feats rather than by BAB, then there's an argument that you can use a natural weapon for multiple offhand attacks.

Then there's the Second Slam feat (Races of Eberron). It's not clear if this second slam comes from the same arm that you used for the first slam attack. It's also not clear if this second attack at -5 BAB is the same as a second iterative attack with a primary weapon. Since the initial slam can be primary or secondary... well. It's a bit ambiguous. If you're using the same arm for both slams, then this doesn't satisfy TWF, as two attacks with a single weapon doesn't count as Two-Weapon Fighting. If the First Slam and Second Slam are made with different arms, then that should count as two weapons and could be used for TWF. You'd still only get a single iterative attack with the first slam, though, as per the MM p. 312 rule.

So. The Battle Fist. The description of how this weapon works is a *MESS*. The text:

"Battlefist (attached component): This +1 weapon resembles a massively oversized spiked gauntlet; one designed for a Medium warforged looks like a gauntlet designed for an ogre. It attaches to the arm of a warforged, completely covering the hand. This component only operates when attached and locked in place. A battlefist increases the damage dealt by the character’s natural slam attack to 1d8 points of bludgeoning and piercing damage (assuming a Medium character). Versions with higher enhancement bonuses are not uncommon. A warforged monk who uses a battlefist deals increased unarmed damage as though the character were one size larger than actual, and he can add the battle fist’s enhancement bonus to his unarmed attack and damage rolls."

Whoever wrote this appears to be confused about whether a spiked gauntlet, slam attack, and unarmed strike are all the same kind of weapon. (Hint: they aren't.) The first sentence says it has a +1 enhancement bonus, but it's not clear if this only applies to a spiked gauntlet attack or a slam. The second sentence is primarily fluff description. The third sentence increases the bludgeoning damage on a warforged's slam up to 1d8, but it's still not clear if the "battlefist" itself is a separate attack, a spiked gauntlet attack, or whatever. To avoid unnecessary rules headaches, it's probably best to assume that the "battlefist" is the same as your slam attack, so it gets a +1 enhancement bonus and increases the damage by a step. Presumably, you could add additional weapon enhancements to your slam by enchanting the battle fist.

The last sentence only applies to Warforged monks. If you have no monk levels, you ignore it. If the warforged has monk levels, then the enhancement bonus applies to your unarmed strikes, and you also get a size increase on your damage. It's not clear if you still have the +1 and 1d8 damage on your slam attack, but based on the RAW, yes, you should still have that (although including the slam in a Flurry is problematic, since "slam" is not considered a special monk weapon).

So... you can make iterative attacks with unarmed strikes, so a Warforged monk with a battlefist might work well with TWF: you get iterative attacks with your unarmed strike, and you can use your slam as your offhand weapon. If you add Second Slam, you get an additional slam attack at BAB -5, and that's without TWF penalties. You also get the enhancement bonus and damage increase on both your unarmed strikes and the slam.

Adding a second battlefist... based on RAW, I don't see if this actually adds anything other than descriptive fluff. You'd need some house rules or an understanding from the DM that you can attack with both battlefists as two different weapons via TWF. I would presume that mounting two battlefists does not increase your slam damage by two steps.



What's the best 4th level Buff/De-buff spell to put in a wand? I'm thinking Greater Invisibility or something like that.


I'm fond of heart of water (which gets you freedom of movement). Heart of earth gets you stoneskin.


Airstep Sandals make you end your movement on solid ground, otherwise you fall. So no, not really flight.

Perfect maneuverability means you can effortlessly hover in mid-air, so there's an argument that once the Airstep Sandals are bound to your feet chakra, you no longer "fall" and thus don't have to land.

[OgresAreCute]

Perfect maneuverability means you can effortlessly hover in mid-air, so there's an argument that once the Airstep Sandals are bound to your feet chakra, you no longer "fall" and thus don't have to land.

Shaped airstep sandals have "Good" maneuverability, which also allows you to hover under normal circumstances, so this argument is hardly convincing.

[liquidformat]

A slam is a natural weapon, which involves different rules than manufactured weapons. When you add a battlefist... the rules all go a bit pear-shaped.
...
I know you literally wrote the book on TWF but from what I am understanding you are trying to make a case for natural weapons being used as off hand attacks which is just wrong. Natural weapons fall outside of twf and normally outside of the iterative system, the exceptions being rapid strike, improved rapid strike and second slam. I will agree warforged are confusing because they do a horrible job at saying what part of the body your slam is associated with. However, since spiked body gives you piercing damage and you can twf+slam or two-handed weapon + slam slam is clearly not limited to your hands.

As far as the above build goes, I don't think a second battlefist is actually doing anything for you unless your dm is letting you stack the size adjustments. In which case specialize in unarmed strikes+slams, monk belt + 2 battlefist.